Acts of Faith
by Nialte
Summary: A Forgotten Realms Adventure set in Daggerdale, 1372 DR. The first chapter which contains the background of an old character I used to play, as she prepares to fight an insidious Dark Elf threat.


A Forgotten Realms adventure of my former Druid PC. Setting is Daggerdale, 1372. This is the first story I've ever posted, and chapter 2 will focus on the meeting of her companions and their individual background histories.

Review at your leisure.

Acts of Faith:

Chapter 1:

Cold sweat runs down the azure lines of her face as the one-hundred-and-something year old Moon Elf trances. Her focus broken by the malicious thoughts that flicker through her head as she growls in frustration of not even finding the solace and tranquillity of rest to calm her nerves. Even within the subtle peace of her glade she cannot find slumber, and it wore her patience down to a sharp edge not unlike that of her longsword she carried at her side. The scars of her soul ran as deep as those of the very soil. Something was intruding into her home. The blood in her veins flowed hot, and she emits a guttural snarl that would cause lesser mortals to quake before her. The trees called for blood and she would personally deliver the payment of flesh owed to the very bones of the earth beneath her feet.

At 4' 6'' she was short for her race, but her height deficiency mattered little to the druid as she was of the caste that could mimic the very glory of Nature's savagery. Regularly assuming the baleful visage of wolves most supreme to destroy trespassers and delight in the taste of both their blood and fear on her bared teeth. It wasn't uncommon however to simply hunt her foes in her natural, bipedal form. Her slim frame and feral beauty captivating those fellow fey and humans whom she spares, so that they may bring tale to others that her glades are well defended by a violent extension of Nature's will and the very beasts that bring chills to the core of their souls. She presented herself in the hides of her former prey, her body and feet bound in the thick skin and fur of her quarries. Her face delicate, but comprised of sharp features sporting two gold flecked eyes of brilliant green amidst the blue-edged lines of her face. Her hair a tangled flow of raven-black that cascaded to her lower back. She was the ultimate exemplar of a savage specimen of her race and caste. Nothing of her form was marred with the disgusting signs of civilisation ... everything was weathered by the glorious elements that sought to test her. Nature only rewards the strong with another day of subsistence.

Her companion, a dire wolf she had raised almost from very conception when her mother was killed by hunters whilst she was giving birth. The druid remembered, both with enmity and amity, how she managed to rescue the pup from certain death whilst exacting brutal vengeance on those that almost damned her. She gently stroked the lengths of black, white and grey hair that shimmered in a brilliant ray of light that filtered through the deep canopy above her. The wolf was still resting... twitching and whining every now and again from perils only tangible within the depths of her dreams. Abating slightly at the tough of her spiritual sibling. She and her companion were not always alone in her quest to protect the solitary structure that greeted her back as she slumps to the ground beside both her protector and charge. The pitted, slate-grey monument designed to guide a long departed circle of antiquity that no one could now remember. She was born Nialte Selaar, a name she no longer needed nor wished to recover. A student of the Circle of the Rippling Brook ... a small, clandestine organisation comprising of atmost 30 druids and their pupils... albeit her former circle were distributed across the length of Cormanthor and any accurate number of membership was largely impossible.

The guardian of the forests shook her head as memories of her youth flowed at a quickened pace to intrude unwelcome upon her psyche. Trying in vain to dispel the thoughts of her largely shameful childhood. She was once a 'servant' of Mielikki... a fact that brings her intense mourn. It wasn't until she discovered the Gods of Fury that she developed into a true force of ecological respite. She identified with Malar only after encountering a member of the Black Blood when she was walking through the forests late into her training. It was then her eyes were open to the true order of the wilds. When it was discovered by her mentor that she aided the Black Blood membership to escape the hunters of her circle she was dispossessed of her ancestral home and sent alone into the wilderness to carve her own namesake in this bitter world. The Malarites whom she protected before took her in, and provided her the true access necessary for her growing potential. It was then that she discovered .... 'It'....

The monolithic construction of a bygone era...

Little could be said to recount it's history. Certainly nothing to be spoken of it's creators. Despite this the stalker of the wilds knew the scattered details of it's power one day when she recited the incantations to encase her spirit and body within the divine stone. The druidess regaled the memories of her previous attempts to analyse the nature of the stone as she ran her hands tenderly over the object. A rare smile creased her features as she turns to rest her cheek against the cold rock. As if cradling a giant baby she cooed at the stone with a motherly tone, as if pleading with the structure's soul to release it's secrets. Every second day, like clockwork, she would study it .... again and again ... rarely coming into contact with her Malarite brethren of whom would occasionally visit her abode to inform that another ritualistic hunt of captured loggers was being staged within the tenday. Apart from her time with the menhir and feasting with her beloved companion, her most cherished activities were the ritual hunt of so-called 'civilised folk'.... particularly those that have wronged the trees with their axes, or slaughtered animals for profit.

The druid licked her lips when recounting the number of times she dined on human flesh. It was neither the taste, nor the texture that drew her to the sacred hunts initiated by her siblings born from an acknowledgement of Malar's savage beauty and perfect maxims. Human flesh tastes awful. The smell hangs in your nostrils ... their taint hangs heavy on the palate. It was the intoxicating sense of danger, and the beautiful siren call of tapping into the spirit of bestial instinct as it conquers the fallible belief that logic and civility develops a creature to be better than they are. The Malarite knew quite well what little value the gift of intellect was in the face of primal intuition ... she knew it better than any other who had yet to participate in their sacred activity. That was the reason for why she loved the sacred hunt... and it was also all the proof she needed that her faith was not only truth, but the ONLY truth. One could never understand until they sink their fangs and claws into the prey, bathing in the lifeblood of a felled quarry.

However this was not the time for reminiscing, but for action. This was the time to exact a duty that all druids should maintain at the very least, whether of Malar or Mielikki. Dark-skinned cousins have intruded on her lands, destroying the essence of beauty found in bark and leaf in their relentlessness. A clan of them no less, ruining the soil, felling the trees … stepping uninvited into her demesne. The young druid smiled sinisterly ... the trees will certainly have their tribute of blood. The Drow had become more brazen in their attempts to scour over old ruins that lie amongst the roots of trees, slowly being disintegrated by the pounding rain. Such was the price born of civilisation, the undeniably fact that Nature consumes all in her stead. What point is there to empires? It takes little more than patience, wind and rain to eliminate all vestiges of it's existence.

With such a threat, the priestess of the Beastlord set her sights on traversing the wilds once more in search of her targets. Leaving behind that which she sought so desperately to understand. She would return one day, but only when she has dealt with this malicious new enemy that threatens her sublime authority within the lengths of her territory. With mourn in her heart she sets off to discover details as to the whereabouts of her prey. Finding purpose and strength within the conviction born from almost tactile belief that she would drink from the chalice that would be the broken bodies of the Drow. A new moon will rise, ripe with promise of a supreme feast filled with carrion left to the eagles of the sky, and the roots of the earth. The hunt begins once more.

To be continued


End file.
